Assemblyman Kevin de Leon won a state Senate seat Tuesday, while West Covina Councilman Roger Hernandez took a key step toward winning an Assembly seat.

And Rep. Gary Miller survived a scare Tuesday, holding on to defeat three Republican primary challengers although he received less than a majority vote.

By a 2-1 margin, Hernandez defeated Al Contreras, president of the Upper San Gabriel Valley Municipal Water District board, in the bid to succeed Assemblyman Ed Hernandez, D-West Covina.

Hernandez now will run against Republican Brian Gutierrez, a student from West Covina, in the 57th Assembly District.

Hernandez said he believes he won because of his work as a councilman and his message.

“The people of the 57th Assembly District want California lawmakers to focus on job creation and want us to focus on solving their problems,” he said.

“We need to continue reaching out,” he said. “I’m grateful to be the Democratic nominee but I still have to get past to the general election.”

Contreras said he believes there were two reasons he lost.

“Money, No. 1, and I guess they preferred Roger’s message better than mine,” he said.

De Leon with about 71 percent of the vote defeated Alejandro Menchaca and Edward Paul Reyes in the Democratic primary for the 22nd state Senate District that will be vacated by Sen. Gil Cedillo, D-Los Angeles, who is termed out. All are from Los Angeles.

No Republican ran so DeLeon will have no opposition in November.

De Leon said he believes he won because of his two landmark bills that became law.

He authored a law requiring handgun ammunition purchasers to acquire a permit showing they’ve passed a background check and legislation providing $400 million for local park assistance.

“These are two accomplishments I think that spoke volumes for voters,” he said.

In the Republican primary race for the 42nd District for the U.S. House of Representatives, Miller had his first contested primary since knocking off then Rep. Jay Kim in 1998.

Miller won with only 49 percent of the vote.

His closest opponent was Phil Liberatore, a Whittier certified public accountant who received 37 percent of the vote.

Lee McGroarty, a business owner from Chino, received 11 percent and David Su, a sales representative from Diamond Bar, garnered 3 percent.

“We knew going in that this was going to be an anti-incumbent year,” Miller said Wednesday. “I don’t think it was that close but it was closer than it might have been.”

Liberatore said he lost because of Miller’s incumbency.

“Gary Miller had the press in his pocket,” he said. “He controls all of the cities. He’s the incumbent and everybody is bowing down to this guy. It was hard to get any response from the media.”

Tim Escobar, chairman of the Southeast Chapter of the Los Angeles County Lincoln Clubs, said he thought the race was so close because of the attacks on Miller made by Liberatore.

“The information that was put out apparently caught the voters’ attention to some degree,” Escobar said.

“The votes Gary (made) weren’t popular,” he said, referring to the multi-billion-dollar bailouts of Wall Street and the Cash for Clunkers program.

Liberatore mailed fliers and purchased newspaper ads, after loaning his campaign $725,000. Miller reported spending about $330,000 but said that only $200,000 was for the campaign. The rest was for office expenses.

Miller was particularly unhappy about a piece that said he wasn’t honest about time spent in the U.S. military.

Also re-elected were Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca and Supervisor Gloria Molina, both of whom had no opposition.

Mike Sprague started at the Whittier Daily News in April 1984. Since then, Sprague has covered every city in the Whittier Daily News circulation area, as well as political and water issues. Sprague received a bachelor's degree in communications and a master's degree in political science, both from Cal State Fullerton.